Observations from a Newbie

[joelshort]

I'm new!  Brief "about me":  I've been into astrophotography for about 10 years now, back when the Meade DSI's were popular.  I now image with a SV152 f/8 LZOS triplet refractor and various camera lenses, with a SBIG STF-8300M.  If you want to know more or see some of my humble images, please visit my website www.buckeyestargazer.net

As a long time (10yrs) user of Photoshop for image processing I have been reluctant to jump on the PI bandwagon.  I confess, I tried PI about a year ago and felt rather bewildered by the obvious power and complexity of PI, and it appeared as though the underlying processing philosophy was quite different from what I was used to. 

I've recently decided to learn PI and force myself to become familiar with this powerful processing software.  I must say, the second time around has gone much better.  Perhaps I now know what I'm getting into whereas the first time I just felt lost.  This post is to record some of my initial observations about PI from a baby newbie perspective.  Perhaps in a year from now I can look back at this thread and give myself a good laugh at how ignorant I was!

Special thanks to Harry Page for his very good intro to PI videos!  You have helped me immensely!

Observations:
1.  I really like the idea of being able to look at images in linear form and do some initial processing steps like gradient removal and color calibration, prior to stretching and other, more invasive, processing steps.
2.  The DBE tool is A.W.E.S.O.M.E!
3.  I constantly find myself accidentally hovering my mouse over the left hand column where "Process Explorer" etc. is located and surprising myself when the menu appears out of nowhere.  I'll get used to it....

1/13/2015
4.  Narrowband processing is truly bewildering!  The subjective nature of color rendering makes color calibration really difficult.

1/30/2015
5.  Noise handling with MultiScaleLinearTransform in linear stage is awesome.  Lots of control and applying a linear mask is perfect for protecting structures while attacking the background noise.
6.  There are lots of ways to create star masks:  StarMask, ATrousWaveletTransform (uncheck R channel), RangeSelection and Pixel Math to combine separate masks (?).

2/1/2015
7.  ColorCalibration is AWESOME!  Learn how to use it well.
more to come...

[Harry page]

Hi

Welcome to Pi , I am sure your patience will be rewarded

If you don't like the hover effect on the side bar go to EDIT-Global Preference's and uncheck the hoverable autohide window selectors

( apply global as well )

Then the side bars will only open on click   8)

Regards

Harry

[joelshort]

Thanks Harry.  It's not that I don't like the hover, it's just something to get used to like everything else. 

[MortenBalling]

Hi Joel

Welcome to the wonderful world of PI. Hang on, and you won't regret it. Even though I still find some of the math behind PI complicated, I start to feel safe and at home, once the software starts up. I come from a similar software as you, and work very much in a visual way, and therefore a word like transformation used to mean moving the image along an axis. Things like that takes a little while to get used to, but once you learn the lingo, a whole new universe lies ahead.

Nice gallery btw.

And once again. Thanks a googolplex^n to Harry. If you ever run for president, you can count on my wote!

Best regards

Morten

[iksose7]

Hi Joel,

I too am a PI newb! Like you i tried PI a while back and was a bit overwhelmed, but Juan was kind enough to grant me a second trial a couple months back and i was hooked, so much so that i just bought my license a couple days ago and i am now trying to re-learn everything again, Harry videos and the tutorials on this forum obviously coming in very handy

Your 3 observations are also mine, and no doubt what most notice at first when confronted with PI. Need to improve my hand-eye coordination to stop that process explorer pop-up

Callum

[joelshort]

So here's my first quick and dirty image processed with PI (vdB15)!  I have to say, I am well pleased...not that the photo is anything spectacular, but I really like how PI handled the color calibration and saturation.  My previous processing attempt on this resulted in a very "flat" color rendering.  With PI I'm seeing different shades of red that I hadn't seen before. 

Up next will be a reprocess of a galaxy.

[RickS]

That's a nice result, Joel.

There's a bit of a learning hump to get over when you start with PI but once you've done that the sky is the limit  8)

Cheers,
Rick.

[Warhen]

Welcome Joel!

[joelshort]

Thanks Warren.  Unfortunately I've not had as much time to play with PI as I would like, but I'll get there.  I feel like I've just barely scratched the surface but I like what I see. 

[joelshort]

4.  Narrowband processing is truly bewildering!  The subjective nature of color rendering makes color calibration really difficult.

I feel as though I have a good if (very) basic workflow down for traditional LRGB processing, but narrowband processing is completely foreign to me in PI.  Thankfully there are innumerable tutorials to help guide me.  If anyone has a "must have" BASIC processing workflow tutorial for tri-color narrowband images I'd love to see it.  Special thanks to Kayron Mercieca of Light Vortex Astronomy for the great tutorials which have helped get me started in NB processing.

[jkmorse]

Joel,

I have been keeping a cribsheet that I share with a distribution list that includes some great insights from others, including narrowband processing methods.  Here is a PDF copy, though I had to cut a bunch to get it to fit.  If you are interested in a full Word version, just drop me a line at jkmorse57@gmail.com.

Best,

Jim

[joelshort]

5.  Noise handling with MultiScaleLinearTransform in linear stage is awesome.  Lots of control and applying a linear mask is perfect for protecting structures while attacking the background noise.
6.  There are lots of ways to create star masks:  StarMask, ATrousWaveletTransform (uncheck R channel), RangeSelection and Pixel Math to combine separate masks (?).

[oldwexi]

Hi Joel!
The "Blend" script allows you to create starmasks with fine sharp stars and large stars.
One of the Blending Options (the last one) is Starmask.
The script creates a new Starmask everytime you move the 2 sliders -
you try until you have the right one.

Have a try.

Gerald


http://www.werbeagentur.org/oldwexi/Daten/Blend_StarMask_english.js

[joelshort]

Thanks! i"ll give it a try.   So many tools....

[joelshort]

Here's a reprocess of IC342, a galaxy that is shrouded by foreground dust.  Also on the webpage is my previous effort with Photoshop.  Since I'm just learning PI, this is the best I can do at the moment.  I would greatly appreciate any tips for improvement.  What do you see that I did wrong?  What could be improved?  Etc. Thanks.